A company gradually accumulates data sources, software applications, technology and analytics solutions, and source systems that are often siloed and do not interact with one another. However, the information and analysis needed to address a new and immediate intelligence need of the business are often distributed across those siloed source systems. A company has traditionally used centralized approaches to solve these distributed business problems. The traditional methods of centralizing data and analysis with multi-year data warehousing and integration projects are expensive, inefficient, and unpredictable.
While the specific distributed business problems a company attempts to solve are different and generally particularized to its immediate information needs, certain common denominators exist when implementing a solution in the traditional way. In this approach, data is first centralized into a common storage location that disconnects it from its source system. From there, analytics are applied, creating another level of abstraction from the physical reality of the source system. After multiple such projects, it is difficult to comprehend the original physical structure.
Much cost, time, and risk must be borne to perform this sort of integration of decentralized source systems prior to responding to the immediate business information needs. Data integration and centralization, and their attendant infrastructure costs, must be repeated for implementation of every new business solution, slowing business agility and institutionalizing unnecessary cost. This is due in large part to the necessity of converting the logical design of the desired business intelligence process to the centralized system required to support the logic. Current application project value is either replaced or requires significant rewrites or upgrades every four to six years. Data projects decline in value even more quickly.
As companies and enterprises grow and become more complex, so does the cost, delay, risk, and repetition of the traditional centralized business solutions. The burden of implementing a business solution in the traditional way fundamentally undermines effectiveness of an enterprise. A new approach to solving these distributed business problems is needed.